How much is air worth?

Wyoming hosts San Diego State tonight (if the Aztecs make it to Laramie) and it got me to wondering about the importance of altitude. The Aztecs won at New Mexico last week, and while observers were impressed with the win in the Lobos’ building, nobody really mentioned that they had to overcome the thin air of Albuquerque (elevation 5300 feet) as well. There are a few studies out there that have looked at the difference in a high-elevation team’s winning percentage between home and road games. For some reason, I’d rather know how many points altitude is worth. Wyoming has played San Diego State home and away every season since 2000. In 12 games in Wyoming, the average margin as been +1.0 for Wyoming while the games at San Diego have produced an average margin of +9.4 for the Aztecs. The difference of 10.4 points can’t be explained by raw home court advantage alone, which has long been calculated to be around four points. There are 2.4 points left unaccounted for. This is onl...